This subproject is one of many research subprojects utilizing the resources provided by a Center grant funded by NIH/NCRR. The subproject and investigator (PI) may have received primary funding from another NIH source, and thus could be represented in other CRISP entries. The institution listed is for the Center, which is not necessarily the institution for the investigator. A number of improvements have been made on a regular basis to the distributed control system (DCS) and accompanying graphical user interface Blu-Ice, which is our choice of software suite on BL4-2 since 2004. Incremental improvements to the Blu-Ice/DCS make beam line control and data collection in non-crystalline x-ray scattering/diffraction studies highly efficient, intuitive, and user friendly, and at the same time facilitate new methods of data collection. The most notable improvements made in 2009 include 1) significantly improved GUI for the automated solution sample changer (SolSAXS tab) incorporating a number of new data collection and sample handling features;2) new graphical user interface (GUI) for time resolved studies (TRSAXS tab). The GUI and new hardware control features in the SolSAXS tab have been in routine use by users and collaborators since late July and plays a key role in our high throughput solution scattering development project. The TRSAXS tab has been tested and successfully utilized in actual fast time-resolved studies in July. We plan on updating this tab to include the online control of our Pilatus 300k detector in near future.